


do you love me? will you love me forever?

by buckybunnyteeth



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Idiots in Love, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Marriage of Convenience
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-15
Updated: 2020-04-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:41:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23668546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/buckybunnyteeth/pseuds/buckybunnyteeth
Summary: Todd is walking to work when a catering truck veers through a red light and crashes into a light pole. He watches in horror, as the back doors fly open and a full-on wedding cake- iced with pink flowers and two grooms on the top- slides out and comes to a stop at his feet.“Oh, come on!” he shouts at the cake.Or; the universe isn't subtle and it wants them to get married
Relationships: Todd Brotzman/Dirk Gently
Comments: 26
Kudos: 161





	do you love me? will you love me forever?

"Home is not where you are from, it is where you belong. Some of us travel the whole world to find it. Others, find it in a person."

\- Beau Taplin

Todd is leaning against his desk, sipping his coffee and thinking something along the lines of ‘ _ sweet Jesus this is good coffee’ _ , while Dirk sits behind his own desk across from him, babbling his head off. The babbling had initially been about a suspicious goat they had met last week, had gone onto some kind of quantum physics bashing rant, and Todd had tuned out around when  _ Thor _ was being mentioned.

“-and whilst I have tried to get a second opinion from the universe, which you are well aware is impossible and infuriating at the best of times- it all seems to be pointing to the same answer.”

“Hmm?” Todd takes a sip of coffee, still not listening properly.

“-and the answer is that you and I should get married.”

Surprise catches at the back of his throat and Todd spits his coffee out, right in Dirk’s face.

Dirk, to his credit, stands up and shrieks.

“ _ What _ ?” Todd yells, “What did you say?”

“You  _ spat _ on me!” Dirk yells back, hands waving around dramatically as he scrambles for something to wipe himself off, and finding only paper and thumbtacks, “You-you spat  _ coffee _ on me!  _ Todd _ !”

“Oh for-” Todd swipes his scarf from his desk and leans over, wiping down Dirk’s face and the shoulders of his jacket where the worst of the coffee hit, “-there.”

Dirk calms down, face pouting as if Todd intended to spit coffee all over him.

“I’m sticky!”

“Sorry,” Todd huffs, “I’ll get your spare clothes- after you explain why on earth you think we should get  _ married _ !”

And Farah, who has been standing across the room the whole time, who watched the whole situation unfold with a slack jaw- gets up with a shouted; “I’m going for coffee!”

Then she sprints out the door, past the brand new shiny coffee maker, and without either her keys or wallet. She’s gone in a flash.

Todd wishes he could do the same, but he has the sinking feeling Dirk would follow him.

“It’s simple, Todd,” Dirk sighs with exasperation as he peels off his coffee-soaked jacket, brushing off the periwinkle pleather as he does, “The universe has been sending me signs that you and I should be wedded.”

“Don’t phrase it like that- what kind of signs?”

“Well, firstly when we were in that hotel last week the clerk assumed you were my husband and called you Mr. Gently,” Dirk explains, unknotting his tie as well, “Although that didn’t stop him from flirting rather brazenly at me.”

Todd frowns.

“He flirted with you?”

“And then after that,” Dirk continues, ignoring Todd’s question, “These got delivered to the office.”

Dirk pulls a stack of envelopes out of his desk and plonks them down in front of Todd. They are all bills or promotions for credit cards and all are addressed to ‘Mr. Dirk Gently and Mr. Todd Gently’.

Todd feels his face begin to heat.

“Well, th-that’s really-”

“Then there were the car salesmen, the weatherman and the calligrapher-  _ all _ of them made passing comments about my grouchy,  _ irritable _ husband.”

“Oh, well-”

“And then the wedding planner moved in next door and hasn’t left me alone since!” Dirk swishes his tie off and slumps back down into his chair, throwing up his hands, “And that’s not even the half of it, Todd. It’s getting ridiculous, our last case was a trial to get through because of all the signs the universe was whipping at me.”

Their last case. The case of the Seattle Heiresses missing earrings.

The Heiress herself had spent the majority of the case throwing innuendoes at Todd and laughing when she made him uncomfortable.

Todd feels the fight leave him when he realizes what is happening.

He sighs and claps a hand down on Dirk’s shoulder. Dirk, as surprised by the friendly touch as he always is, looks up at him with wide guileless eyes.

“Dirk,” he says as softly as he can, feeling a similarly soft smile spread across his face, “You know I want to be here right? With you and Farah- and even sometimes the Rowdy’s, I can admit that- solving cases, being detectives, you know there isn’t anywhere else I’d rather be right?”

Dirk frowns and nods.

“Good,” Todd pats his shoulder and turns away, heading to the back to grab Dirk some clean clothes, “You don’t need to marry me to keep me here, buddy. I promise.”

“Todd!” Dirk calls, “That’s not what I- oh, bollocks.”

Over the next few days, Todd makes an effort to be friendlier to Dirk. He doesn’t know what he did to make Dirk think that he was going to leave, what caused that kind of anxiety, but he wants to stop it in its tracks. 

Because he has accepted his fate, that he is to always be the Watson to Dirks unconventional Sherlock. Or, perhaps Farah is Tintin and he is the Johnson to Dirks John-

Nope.

Bad sentence, not finishing that.

Whatever- he knows that the rest of his life is going to be spent with Dirk. He has accepted that news from the universe, and all that comes with it.

But he has less belief in the universe telling Dirk that they should get married.

Dirk has had a rough life and while Todd doesn’t know all the details he knows enough to realize a lot of Dirk’s issues revolve around fear of abandonment and fear of being alone. He knows that Dirk has lied to him in the past just to make him stay and be his friend, and he’s forgiven Dirk for that, but he hasn’t forgotten. Dirk is constantly afraid that one day all of them will wake up and leave him.

Todd never plans on doing that.

Of course, there is another possibility.

He stands in his kitchen, meds sliding down his throat as his mind spins in another direction.

Maybe Dirk asked him to marry him to ask him out.

He tried to become his friend by crawling through his window. It’s not a huge leap to assume this could be his way of asking Todd to go out with him.

Todd bites his lip.

Would he say no to being Dirk’s boyfriend?

He’s …. He’s not sure.

He downs his drink and goes back to his room to get dressed for the day, determined not to think about that right now.

Of course, he should know by now; the universe doesn’t care what he does and doesn’t want to think about. The universe is, largely, a bitch.

Todd is in the office the next day when he gets a phone call.

“Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency,” he rattles off as he is arranging the stickers that Dirk swears are vital to an investigation they aren’t investigating yet, “Todd speaking, how may we help you today?”

“Hi, Mr Gently!” A perky woman’s voice answers, “I’m Kay, calling on behalf of Mercer Insurance and we were wondering if you and your husband would be interested in filing for life insurance with our company?”

“Oh, oh I-”

“With life insurance you and your husband would be guaranteed a secured future should one of you pass away unexpectedly, and we have several policies covering funeral insurance as well.”

“No, I’m- Dirk isn’t my husband.”

“I can assure you Mr gently, that we here at Mercer Insurance are fully accepting of people of all sexualities, religions and creeds, and we would be happy-”

Todd slams the phone back onto the receiver and pushes himself back from his desk.

He leans back and glares up at the ceiling.

“I don’t know what game you’re playing,” he says to the plaster, “but I’m not playing it.”

Dirk comes in then, lunch cradled in take away bags in his arms, and looks up at the ceiling too.

“…invisible bats?” he asks.

Todd rolls his eyes and snatches a bag out of Dirks arms. He really needs some comfort food right now.

He spends the rest of the afternoon watching Dirk stand on chairs and search the ceiling for invisible hanging bats.

The day after that Todd gets ten different letters addressed to Mr Todd Gently.

He shreds them all and then burns them in the alley out back.

He and Dirk are on a steak out later that week when the universe throws its next curveball.

They are standing in a park, half staking out a mailbox that Dirk insists is being lived in by someone, but mostly eating a box of fries and vegan fried chicken, when they both hear the sound of an engine and look up.

“Oh no.”

A sky writer is just finishing up on the question mark, spelling out in giant cloud like letters;

_ WILL YOU MARRY ME? _

Dirk gasps, fries flying everywhere as he lurches to his feet.

“Todd!” he exclaims, “Oh my god!”

“No!” Todd throws up his hands, “No, Dirk I didn’t-”

Across the square a woman squeals and throws herself down into the arms of another woman who is knelt down and holding up a ring box.

“Oh,” Dirk says.

“Yeah, you can see-”

“That poor woman, Todd we have to tell her- excuse me, Miss!”

“Dirk, no! No, it’s not-!”

He has to tackle him to keep Dirk from ruining the women’s post engagement Instagram photos.

Todd is walking to work when a catering truck veers through a red light and crashes into a light pole. He watches in horror, as the back doors fly open and a full-on wedding cake- iced with pink flowers and two grooms on the top- slides out and comes to a stop at his feet.

“Oh, come on!” he shouts at the cake.

The people helping the driver, who doesn’t look to be seriously hurt, stop to glare at him.

“Okay!” Todd announces when he walks into Dirks apartment the next day, uninvited and unannounced, “I am not willing to admit that the universe is demanding that we get married, but I just got chased down the street by a wedding band that’s desperate for work so-”

Todd drops to his knees and pulls the plastic ring be bought at the candy store on the way here out of his pocket, holding it up to Dirk.

“-Dirk Gently will you marry me?”

Dirk, who was in the middle of brushing his teeth, looks the most shocked that Todd’s ever seen him. His eyes go wide and a glob of white toothpaste falls onto his pyjama top.

“ _ Yefp _ !”

He shouts this, spits the toothbrush into the sink and throws himself down onto Todd.

“Yes!”

“Ow,” Todd feels his skull rattle against the tiles.

“Oh Todd!” Dirk squeezes him and actually shimmies with excitement, “I can’t believe- do you want a spring wedding? I don’t actually know what a spring wedding means, but they always want one on that ungodly television program where they choose ugly dresses to get married in. Or do you want to get married in another season, I don’t really mind but Winter might be a bit tricky, what with the snow and all-”

Todd closes his eyes to reign in his frustration. His spine is really beginning to hurt.

“I was actually thinking we could go to Vegas.”

“Ooh! That sounds fun. When?”

“Um … Now?”

Dirk detaches from him, hovering over him and grinning.

“Yes! Excellent work Todd, I’ll go tell Farah you steal us a car!”

“Steal a-? Why can’t we just take yours?”

“…Okay, we can. But it’s not as romantic.”

Dirk jumps up from him and bolts from the room. Two seconds later he hears the front door of the apartment slam.

“I wonder if he knows he’s not wearing pants.”

It takes them the whole day to drive from Seattle to Las Vegas. Dirk insists it actually took seventeen hours and Todd has to argue that just because Google told him it would take that long doesn’t mean it actually did. Google didn’t take into account Dirks need to stop and use the bathroom ever five hours, or Farah’s strict adherence to the driving schedule she drew up.

Or the fight the Rowdy 3 get into on the expressway.

When they get to Vegas it takes a couple of hours to get the paperwork, and then another couple of hours for the Rowdy’s to destroy a hotel lobby. They eventually wind up at the Graceland Chapel, and Todd wonders how his life got to this point; standing in front of Elvis, wearing a wrinkled t-shirt and his worst pair of jeans, while his sister and a gang of sort-of-vampires hoot, howl and sing a very punk (and very bad) rendition of here comes the bride from the pews, Farah stands behind him holding a giant bouquet of carnations which she is quietly crying into, and his husband to be stands beside him in a tuxedo. Because of course a traveling tuxedo salesman ran into them on the way in, along with his wife the traveling florist. And of course, he only had one suit left, exactly in Dirks size.

Its certainly not the traditional Jewish wedding his mother envisioned for him.

The Elvis sways his hips, rhinestones shimmering duller than the sweat that’s streaming out from under his wig, and points at them dramatically.

“And do you, Todd, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband till death do you part, uh-huh?”

Todd swallows.

“I-uh, I do.”

Amanda screams-

“Fuck yeah!”

-and the Rowdy’s all make barking dog noises. He hopes that they are barking for him. Not at him.

“Alright! And do you, Dirk, take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband till death do you part, no returning to sender?”

Dirks smile could replace the sun. It's so bright.

“Yes, I do.”

Something clenches in Todd’s chest and he finds it suddenly hard to breathe.

The Rowdy’s all start stamping their feet rhythmically, and Amanda drums her sticks along the back of a pew seat.

“Then by the power vested in me by the great state of Nevada, I now pronounce you two little chick-a-dees, husband and husband! You may now kiss your spouse, thank ya’ very much!”

Dirk jumps up and down once, looking so unbelievably happy as Farah, Amanda and the Rowdy’s shower them both with rice. Then he turns to Todd, wraps him up in his arms, and dips him into a kiss.

It’s probably the best kiss Todd’s ever had.

He grips Dirks arms (which are really … nice, nice arms he was not expecting) and kisses back. and all the while his mind keeps spiralling with the same thought-

_ You’re going to wreck him. You’re going to ruin him. What have you done? _

Their reception is held over three tables at a Burger King. Both Dirk and Todd wear a paper crown while the Rowdy’s oscillate between stuffing their faces and committing property damage, while Amanda tells Farah embarrassing stories about what Todd was like when they were younger.

And the whole time Dirk sits pressed up against Todd’s side, resting his head on his shoulder. It makes drinking his milkshake a little hard.

Todd barely speaks through the whole meal.

After the reception winds down-

“That’s three Burger kings we’re banned from now!” Amanda yells from where she is tossed over Martins shoulder.

“Yeah!” Grips screams while Vogel and Cross flip the bird at the slightly smoking building

-Farah drops them off at their hotel.

“Have a nice night!” she says as she waves them off, “I mean, more than nice, better than nice- but um- don’t tell me any details. Bye.”

“Bye Farah!” Dirk waves her off, “Have fun with Amanda!”

Farah grimaces in embarrassment and leaves with a wave in return.

Todd sucks in a fortifying breath and opens the hotel door, determined to get a good night’s sleep so he can work through his churning thoughts.

And then he sees the bed.

Behind him Dirk makes an excited squealing noise and runs past him.

To jump up onto the freaking heart shaped bed.

“ _ Look _ , Todd!” he exclaims, “It’s a heart! And-”

He jumps down off the bed and sprints into the bathroom.

“-and so is the  _ bath _ !”

Todd drops his bag. Then he toes off his shoes and lays down on the bed on his back. The ceiling has fat faced cherubs carved into the plaster.

He never thought he would ever get married. Honestly, he never thought he would like someone enough to stay with them. And he never thought he would spend his honeymoon in a hotel room with red shag carpeting, pink wallpaper that is spotted with love hearts, and a telephone on the side table that is shaped like a big pair of lips.

He looks up into the face of one of the cherubs and feels a distinct sliver of dread.

Dirk comes out of the bathroom, bow tie undone and jacket off, carrying a rhinestone encrusted door sign that says; DO NOT DISTURB (LOVE IS BEING MADE) on it.

“Should I hang this on the door?” he asks, already doing so as he does, “Don’t want anyone barging in, though I do think hotel employers hire people on their ability to not barge- well, you worked in a hotel so you should know … though you were fired, I suppose.”

He locks the door and then turns back to face Todd. Then he bites his lip and comes over to the bed to lay down next to Todd, reclining in an obviously posed position, head leaning up on one hand while the other is on his hip.

Todd feels like he’s having an out of body experience.

"So…" Dirk says with false casualness, "what shall we do now?"

_ Sleep!  _ Is what his mind shouts first. And then a moment later it whispers;  _ or maybe we could make out with him. _

Panic and lust swirl around in his gut and all Todd can think about is how he only ever hurts the people he cares about.

"I'll be a shit husband," he blurts out.

Dirk's fingers, that had been walking up Todd's chest, pause.

"Pardon."

"I mean I'm like a shit person right?" Todd continues, feeling his face flush because having this many feelings is embarrassing, "And a shit friend- I know you don't like it when I say that but it's a fact. Some people's default is a normal well adjusted person and mine is just … bastard. All the time. I have to try to not be a bastard, because I don't like it- nobody likes it! And now we're married and-and you're stuck with me which means you're going to figure out how fucked up I am and-"

_ You'll hate me. _

He can't bring himself to say the words they scare him so much.

Dirk hasn't said anything through his whole panicked tirade, and had only moved the slightest bit to flatten his palm on Todd's chest.

"... Why do you think I don't know you?"

"Huh?"

"You said now we're married I will realise how shit you are," Dirk continues, looking frustrated, "which I suppose would be true- if I had never met you before we were married. If we hadn't spent almost every day of our lives together for the past year. If we hadn't travelled through time and escaped covert pseudo-government agencies together. If we hadn't done all that then I might be shocked by your sometimes selfish and abrasive behaviour, I suppose."

He slips his hand up from Todd's chest to cup his neck. He feels his breath hitch in his throat and thinks he wouldn't be able to tear his eyes away from Dirk's gaze if the room was on fire.

"But we did do all those things, and you have yelled at me and called me names and spat coffee on me several times-"

" _Once_. I did that once."

"-and even after all the coffee spitting and insults I still love you very much and would be quite delighted to spend the rest of my life with you."

"You … you love me?"

"Of course I love you. Why else would I marry you?"

Todd wants to sputter out something about the universe and crashed catering trucks but all of that falls to the wayside because-

Dirk  _ loves _ him.

Knowing that makes him feel like he’s drank something really fizzy, and also like a whole lot of worms are squirming in his stomach. 

“Fizzy worms.”

“Pardon?”

“Nothing, just- Dirk I-“

The words catch in his throat. He’s never been someone who can just say those words. Every time he has in the past it always felt like they were being physically ripped from him.

… but how many times has someone said them to Dirk?

In his strange lonely childhood, did anyone ever say it?

Todd looks into Dirk's wide guileless eyes and thinks he can deal with anything being ripped from him if it will make Dirk happy.

“-I love you too.”

Dirk rolls his eyes but he’s also grinning.

“I know that, silly,” he taps his forehead on Todd’s shoulder, “you’re not very subtle.”

Todd huffs a laugh.

So Todd was the last to know. Of course. Because if he's not making life difficult for himself is he even living?

"Now," Dirk says, pulling back so he can look Todd in the eye, "If you're quite done, can we please have sex now?"

Todd hums and looks up at the ceiling like he's torn on the idea. 

" _Todd_!"

"...okay, I guess we can."

Todd laughs into the kiss, and only laughs harder when Dirk kneels on some kind of remote neither of them knew was there and the room is suddenly swirling with lava lamp like mood lighting and the crooning of Barry White.

"This is the worst place in the world," he chuckles breathlessly.

Dirk growls, throws the remote across the room which inadvertently shuts everything off and leaves them with only the dim light spilling out of the bathroom. Then he straddles Todd's hips and grabs one of Todd's hands only to slip it down the front of his own pants.

And, well. Dirk had once described him as the kind of person that had, quote: "Boring, boring sex."

Not anymore.

The next week back at their offices a toy store delivery van crashes into a light post out the front and just as Dirk opens the office door to see what's going on a toy pram, complete with a baby that sits up and says "Dada!", slides through the doorway.

Todd, who had been eating a donut, spits it out right in Dirk's face.

"Lunch!" Farah yells as she pushes past where they are standing frozen in the doorway _, "For the love of God I'm going to go get lunch!_ "

  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I have been trying to finish this fic for years! Ugh! Set after season 1 with gauge illusions to season 2 which I hadn't seen when I started writing this! I miss my boys! Tell me what you think.
> 
> And yes, getting married for a good reason but also being in love but being unable to articulate that to you're new spouse is my niche fic trope, what of it?


End file.
